In known cooking units, which are used in kitchen stoves ranges or the like and which may, for example, have a glass ceramic plate as the cover, conventional heating resistors in the form of heating windings are disposed on the underside of the cover. This does, however, have the disadvantage that the cooking unit is heated only in the region of the heating resistors and thus, in the same manner as with the conventional cooking plates, there are produced only narrowly defined points for the transmission of heat from the heating resistor to the substance which is being cooked. Furthermore, in such arrangements it is necessary to have at least one anti-overheating switch for each heating resistor. However, additional temperature regulators are also widely used.